After being crushed in 27TD but played well LO8, this is Hand 13 of the razz round. Been aggressively stealing the bring-ins and antes, stole 6 in a row and villain oddly folds his 8 up against my Q up a few hands ago, so my basic assumption is that he's playing quite tight and straight forward.

1) Did I play 6th street optimally? I'm drawing to a 9 and villain needs to hit well on 6th & 7th. I'm curious as to what his thought process was when he decided to call the way even when I have a paired board. He couldn't be bluff catching with a J could he?

2) Is it a bad idea to raise 5th street for value since I'm drawing to the 9 vs. villain draw to a T? Is this dependent on how smooth or rough your drawing?

3) What if 6th street was reversed and I picked up the Td and villain has the 2s? Could I still drawing to draw to a 9? Further to add, do I check the river if I make the 9 on 7th or could I go for super thin value, since he could have like any low in the hole?


Poker Stars Limit Razz Tournament - t50/t100 Limit + t10 - 2 players

Seat 1: t1295 M = 13.63
Hero (): t1705 M = 17.95

3rd Street: (0.4 SB)
Seat 1: xx xx T____Seat 1 brings in for $15____Seat 1 calls
Hero: 5 8 A___Hero completes

4th Street: (2.4 SB) (2 players)
Seat 1: xx xx T J____Seat 1 calls
Hero: 5 8 A 9___Hero bets

5th Street: (2.2 BB) (2 players)
Seat 1: xx xx T J 3____Seat 1 bets
Hero: 5 8 A 9 A___Hero calls

6th Street: (4.2 BB) (2 players)
Seat 1: xx xx T J 3 T____Seat 1 calls
Hero: 5 8 A 9 A 2___Hero bets

7th Street: (6.2 BB) (2 players)
Seat 1: xx xx T J 3 T xx____Seat 1 calls
Hero: 5 8 A 9 A 2 9___Hero bets

I don't play to much razz, but I think 5th is an ez raise. As in 2 bet/cap.

I think you did good on 6th. Some people try to get cute and check here which i don't like. You are NOT drawing to a 9 and you have villain drawing DEAD. His thought process is the "My fold button is broke" one- or "why didn't he raise on 5th?"

I would have raised 5th here as you are a favorite. Maybe this is one reason the villain called you down as you should have raised on 5th.

Yes, you would be drawing to a rough nine.
You would be second to act if you picked up a Td and the villain the 2s.
I would probably check behind as in this scenario villain could have you board locked and be looking to check raise. This is villain dependent.

1) yes bet
2) raise this everytime
3) call 6th and bet 7th if you improve to a 9 and he checks to you.

What if mashallj is right and villain called 6th and 7th drawing dead because hero flatted 5th?

What are the stakes?

Your opponent doesn't seem very good. If this was HU at the end of a bigger MTT, I think there's good reason to take lower variance lines where possible, since you don't need to exploit thin edges to beat this type of player. So I personally wouldn't get too enthusiastic about capping a decent draw against a made hand on fifth, even if it's clearly correct from a pure value perspective.

Against a good player, it would be a completely different story, and if this is just an HU sit n go, that changes things a lot too.

Hmm... interesting. By that rationale, if I raised 5th instead of flatting and bet 6th, he would've of folded right or continued to call down essentially winning me an extra bet?

Would this be a good play at all if employed as an arsenal in your game?

Well, you only had 60% on 5th and a lot of ways to have him drawing dead on 6th, so trapping seems reasonable, especially if you don't know if he'd 3-bet. The fact he called 4th with JT against A9 indicates he's capable of calling down.

based on villains call on 4th he seems to be inexperienced at razz and is likely to call down in this spot regardless.

but my assumption could be wrong.

first of all there's a huge difference between a fish who will call when he could be way behind and fish who will call when he could be drawing dead. second of all, that's not what I asked. Say you had notes on this villain that say he will call down if you show weakness on 5th st. Do you think it's worth giving up getting in an extra bet with your edge there to possibly set up that scenario?

feels like a numbers question...

putting numbers aside, i can see its short term merits. but in the long run a maniacal image will get these calldowns more often than a trappy image. do you agree or disagree with that?

numbers are part of the game sir.

I agree a maniacal image will get you bad calldowns more often than a trappy one. OTOH a trappy image will get you more free cards and bad folds.

i know .

raise 5th
bet 7th if checked to(if you improve)(if you didn't improve shutdown)

I'm glad we got some new blood in this thread, but you might want to read the HH before giving your 2 cents.